A Middle Eastern Country may be able to dethrone the Nile in Africa as it builds the world’s longest river.
The King Salman Water Conveyance Project in Saudi Arabia costs £400million and involves digging a 7,500 miles long, 11 meter wide, and four meter deep river.
The work will also include the installation of 78,292 miles of anti-corrosion pipes.
This is long enough to wrap around the world three times.
The purpose of the river is to create a sustainable source of drinking water for the country’s growing population.
The river will be one of the world’s largest fresh water networks, producing 9.4million cubic meters of water every day.
Saudi Arabia has long relied on desalination – the removal of salt from sea water – to ensure access to drinkable water.
This is because most of its groundwater is used for agriculture.
Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest producer of desalinated water, generating more than one billion cubic meters each year.
The state does not have any permanent rivers, but does have a number of wadis.
These are riverbeds that are either dry permanently or intermittently.
The longest in Saudi Arabia is Wadi al-Rummah, which is 373 miles long.
But the wadi only flows at full capacity around three times every century.
Saudi Arabia is one of the largest countries in the world without a river.
Saudi journalist, Ahmad Al Shugairi said in his 2021 TV series, Seen: “The amount of effort spent to create underground rivers provides us with water in our homes, even though we are in an area that is mostly desert.
“It is a blessing I was born with, and from getting used to it I forgot it and took it for granted. Thank you to everyone who had a hand that we wake up and find water at home.”
Construction week reports that he added: “After a few years, the length of the water pipes will transport this fresh water from one place to another,” indicating that this project be twice the size of the Nile, which is over 6,000 kilometres long.
